


Very Bad Habits

by TwoCatsTailoring



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Awkward Conversations, M/M, tacky jokes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-26
Updated: 2018-09-26
Packaged: 2019-07-17 21:39:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,039
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16104344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TwoCatsTailoring/pseuds/TwoCatsTailoring
Summary: Dorian is falling in love, but he is terrified of getting hurt. And some of the less-clear parts of the Inquisitor's past are a cause for major concern. But Dorian is nothing if not a quick study, so talking about things is what he does.





	Very Bad Habits

**Author's Note:**

> My Inquisitor Daniel Lavellan is both hella gay *and* the biological parent to a daughter. Dorian, being from a place where those two things almost always equate to back-stairs dalliances that have to be hidden is worried that 1) Daniel lied when he said what they had was more than that and 2) that he's fallen for it again and is just going to end up hurt again.
> 
> Thankfully, clan Lavellan falls in the 'bit-more-flexible' Dalish box.

Dorian hoped he’d be drunk for the conversation about to come. Not that he is completely sober right now, but this feeling? The constriction of his throat, the buzzing in his head, the tension that is wrapping itself around him like a wet blanket? This is not drunkenness. And, when he tried to fix it with copious amounts of sherry, it only morphed into something far bigger and scarier than it was originally.

Originally it had been the fact that most children had both a father and a mother involved in their creation. It had been his general experience that the parents were some form of married - either through the Chantry or the Magisterium or, in the case of slaves, through the permission of their owners. He had initially thought that perhaps Daniel was a widower, but the recent arrival of a letter from his daughter had brought relief that neither the girl nor her mother had been injured in the fighting at Wycome.

That little drop of information had taken a vague worry and turned it into a raging fear. It hadn’t been that long ago that they’d both agreed they wanted more from this than just some casual romp in the sheets. The idea that Daniel would say that and not mean it hurt in old and excruciating ways. The idea that Dorian would believe such a lie again didn’t bear thinking about.

So now here he is, standing in front of the balcony doors in Daniel’s private quarters, watching him roll and light one of his paper-wrapped bundles of pipe herbs. Dorian had been fascinated by the whole process the first half-dozen times he had seen it; most people smoked using pipes but not the Dalish it seemed. Or at least, not this particular Dalish. It varied widely amongst the clans, as he was quick to learn.

And he was stalling. Why was he stalling? If this was going to go as badly as he thought it would, might as well have it done and over with.

“Are you still trying to figure out how my trousers stay up despite my complete lack of arse again or is there something on your mind that keeps you lurking in the doorway?”

He hadn’t even turned around but Dorian had never been able to sneak up on Daniel. Well, save for that one time when he’d been deaf after getting zapped by the Northern Hunter, so that hardly counted as a challenge.

Dorian shrugged and pushed himself off the wall. “While I do find your utter lack of a backside fascinating - How do they stay on? Do I care since they come off so much easier? - that isn’t why I’m here.” He stopped next to Daniel and leaned his back against the railing.

Daniel offered him a smile and something in Dorian’s stomach flipped over unpleasantly. Right, best to have this over with then.

“There is something I want to talk to you about,” he began, lacing his fingers together to keep from plucking at his clothes.

“This sounds serious,” Daniel said, frowning slightly. “Is anything wrong?”

“Not necessarily.” Dorian inhaled, the smell of dried herb smoke barely soothing the edges of his jangling nerves. “I wanted to ask you about your family. You’ve talked about your daughter a great deal, but is there anyone else?”

Daniel’s mouth turned up slightly at one corner, “My clan had 53 people when I left. Which ones are you asking about?”

Dorian sighed and rolled his eyes, “You are teasing me when I am trying to be serious.”

“Yes, I am,” Daniel admitted. “But it’s for your own good. Get to the point, Dorian.”

Dorian made the effort to look shocked at the idea of him ever getting to the point, but did it anyway. “Your daughter, Alaina?”

“Much closer that time. Ahlania,” he corrected his pronunciation. 

“Ahlania,” Dorian tried again, earning him a pleased nod from Daniel. “Are you and her mother still… together?” He knew that the Dalish’s wedding customs were not the same as the humans or the elves in the alienages, but he wasn’t sure how that actually worked. 

“Ah.”

Dorian didn’t know what to make of that sound. Was that a good thing or a bad thing? Had he tripped over some custom he had no knowledge of? He normally didn’t mind offending everyone in the room. Except the only other occupant of this balcony was the last person in Thedas he wanted to hurt, so he pressed on in an effort to explain, “I only asked because I don’t want this to become awkward.”

Daniel’s face was hard to read, but he didn’t appear to be upset. In fact he shrugged as casual as you please. “Narah and I have raised Ahlania together since she was born but we were never a couple.” He laughed, “She’d probably look at you like Cassandra looks at Bull when he’s talking about the dragons if you suggested the idea to her.”

Dorian let that thought sink in while he recovered, both from the surprise and relief that his lover wasn’t married. He’d done that before. It was messy. “That tells me a great deal about her already,” he quipped.

Daniel nodded and explained, “There’s not exactly a lot of chances for a Dalish woman to have children, and Narah had only been with Lavellan for half a year or less. Neither of us wanted to waste the chance.”

Dorian had been following along just fine - he’d learned that clans traded members and he understood all of the reasons for it. It was a system that seemed to work but, “What do you mean, waste the chance?”

“It was no secret to anyone that I, as you’ve so delicately put it, _ prefer the company of men _ ,” Daniel lifted one eyebrow and huffed a laugh, “But there’s not many Dalish women who would be comfortable not being bonded with the father of her children. Narah and I were friends and worked well together, so it actually worked out perfectly for both of us.”

“I’m clearly missing something here. Why was this even something you would consider?” None of what Daniel was saying was making sense to Dorian at all. 

Daniel inhaled a lungful of smoke and gave Dorian a long, searching look before carefully saying, “Because it’s part of my duty to my clan and to the Dalish.”

“Well, at least she didn’t expect you to rearrange your life for the sake of appearances,” Dorian scoffed, “Though you know I object to the notion of doing anything just for the sake of duty.”

It helped, in a way, to know there was a reason. A difference in their adherence of duty was one thing, but the idea that Daniel’s wanting more was flying in the face of an already committed relationship was quite another.  Dorian’s mind was much easier now - the buzzing sound in his head had slowed to a hum, and he could breathe properly again. 

“Yes, I am well aware of that. But I honestly didn’t have any choice,” Daniel looked off somewhere in the middle distance. “One of my cousins dedicated herself wholly to the elven god, No’hdyk and swore off all contact with men. Her older sister was ruined by a night spent under a statue of Fen'harel.  She couldn’t walk for a week and no man will have her now since she dared to lie with the Dread Wolf.”

Dorian’s eyes went wide. He’d heard that the Dalish were strict in their customs but to go that far, “That’s barbaric!”

“But neither compares to the fate of my only male cousin. He tended the halla and dedicates himself to their care to this day even though an accident with one cost him his penis.” Daniel choked a little and raised a hand to his face. “It’s so hard, to be so far away from them.”

Dorian turned and put a hand on his shoulder. He could only imagine - being so close to his family was something Dorian had never experienced, but it clearly meant the world to Daniel.  To see him suffer was painful.

“And to make matters even worse, I’m trapped here with these shems and one of them has written the word gullible on the ceiling!”

Dorian opened his mouth and had the first syllables of comforting words out before he realized what he’d just heard. That the shaking of Daniel’s shoulders was not from tears but from badly contained laughter. 

“You little shit!” Dorian gave Daniel a shove and caught his infectious laughter as it erupted properly. “I can’t believe you would slander your own family so. That is unless those unfortunates don’t exist at all.”

“No, no,” Daniel laughed, “They all do. I’ll tell you about them properly some other time. But Dorian,” His smile stayed but his laughter trailed off as he took Dorian’s hand in his, “our decision to have a child together was driven by the desire to not see the Dalish diminish even more.”

There was obviously something very serious Daniel was trying to say. That was how he approached things: cutting through tense situations with wit and good humor in the hopes that what followed would be heard by more receptive ears.  Dorian was grateful for the habit, and truly wanted to understand what would make a man go against his own nature.

“We meet, every ten years, and as many of us who can make it do go. We trade stories, clan members, the bits of our history that we have found. But every time we meet there are clans who are now dead. Clans who have grown so small that they join others to not be wiped out. We struggle to survive in a world that has decided we are a menace, that decided ages ago that our lives and our gods were illegal.” He stopped and sighed, “Living like that, I think it’s understandable that our children are treasures.”

Dorian had never felt so small in his life as he did right then. Since meeting Daniel there had been several times when his ignorance of the lives of elves was glaringly obvious, but never had the truth of the Dalish’s lives been put in such stark contrast to his own. He could barely take it all in much less make sense of the fact that people - just like the man in front of him whom he loved so much - had been hunted for sport by his own countrymen. It was all so real, so painfully, horribly real. 

“I’m so sorry.” That was so weak. Insufficient. Trite and pointless and foolish of him to even say it.

“You wouldn’t be standing here if you weren’t,” Daniel replied, flicking the last of his ashes over the edge of the balcony and standing up straight again. “Nerah and I are unconventional, and Ahlania knows that. But it hasn’t hurt any of us or the clan, so nothing much is made of it. Nerah bonded with Haras about 11 years ago and they have a son, so everyone is happy.” He narrowed his eyes a bit, “Well, everyone but Ahlania. She thinks having her brother around is nothing short of a punishment. But I think that is just siblings.”

He was doing it again, Dorian could tell. Smoothing out the harsh edges with lighter conversation and Dorian’s heart swelled with gratitude again. It was like the man always  _ knew  _ when to press and when and how to release that pressure. He had to admit that when it came to these sorts of talks, it helped keep things easier to manage in his head. 

“I have no idea,” he admitted freely, “I never had a sibling.”

“Neither did I but my cousins might as well have been for all the trouble we got into together,” Daniel pulled a face that clearly meant he had been a challenging sort of boy.

“I can only imagine. What’s this business about sleeping under a statue of Fen’Harel? Wasn’t he some sort of trickster god?”  More space to think and more entertaining conversational topics. Was this man even real? And how did he, Dorian Pavus, get so lucky as to have him?


End file.
